


day 3: the colors of the night

by halfwheeze



Series: thirty ways to wreck a train [3]
Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, masquerade au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-13
Updated: 2018-03-13
Packaged: 2019-03-30 17:45:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13956777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfwheeze/pseuds/halfwheeze
Summary: a masquerade night.





	day 3: the colors of the night

**Author's Note:**

> hi! this is day three of a 30-day series I'm trying out! I can't say that I'll be fantastic at it, but I'm gonna try!
> 
> Day three is the Reveal of Feelings! Hope you enjoy!

It’s a Masquerade. Ryan knows that the Ladylike girls must have pushed hard for this, because this has to be a security hazard of some description, but it’s super cool. The lights of the building are a dim red, probably through some way of covering, and there are unused masks dangling from the ceiling. The party is already in full swing, loud enough that Ryan can hear it through the entryway, not even having seen another party-goer first. He hears the sound of voices he recognises, voices of friends, and enters the party with a grin already on his face, and he knows that’s all people can see. 

His own mask is red, a little like the one that Shane made him wear for  _ Ruining History _ , and covers the range of his cheekbones and the top of his nose. He knows for fact that the mask is slightly intended to be feminine, emphasized by the black lace-like material on the rim, but it’s comfortable, and it makes him feel safe to be someone, anyone, else. The mask doesn’t conform to his skin, like some of the other masks he tried on, but it also doesn’t protrude, like the masks intended to be masculine that he had looked at briefly and moved on from. He knows that his friends recognise him immediately. 

“Ryan! That’s such a cool mask!” Steven says excitedly, though he doesn’t reach a hand to try and touch it like Ryan guessed he might. It only takes Ryan a moment to realise why he didn’t; both of Steven’s hands are occupied, one with fingers linked with Andrew Ilnyckyj’s, and one on Adam Bianchi’s thigh. The development somehow doesn’t surprise him, and then neither does Jen and Maycie lazily making out against the wall somewhere in the range behind the polyamorous couple.  _ Fucking Buzzfeed, man, _ he thinks with a firelight in his chest, nodding once to Steven and walking off. As much as he loves the guy, he doesn’t think he can stick around Steven and his romantic boyfriends. 

He loves the masks. He didn’t think he would like it this much, but Steven’s was a pretty silver and Andrew’s was grey and Adam’s was a light blue, and they’re all beautiful. Jen and Maycie’s masks were dangling from Jen’s hand last time he checked, but he’s not going to get closer to investigate the colors beneath the red tinged lights. He can see Eugene and Zach dancing in a way that shouldn’t be work party appropriate in the corner of the room, away from their married friends and their Dad dancing with their wives. Ryan is absently glad all of them are happy, if only because they aren’t really close friends. 

“Oh, hi, fuck!” Ryan sputters as someone steps directly into his walking path; he’d been distracted by the light reflecting off of Devin’s teal mask. The mask of the tall stranger is white and gold, and striking in that it’s one of the only full-face masks that Ryan has seen so far. He starts going through the tall men in of Buzzfeed in his head rather quickly, though it’s harder when he can’t pinpoint exactly how tall the other man is - Ryan himself is wearing boots with a slight heel because they went with the aesthetic. It skews his entire interpretation of other people’s heights, which he didn’t realise would happen until it was already happening and he couldn’t change it, of course. 

“You want something?” Ryan asks, raising an eyebrow that he knows the tall guy can’t see. He doesn’t recognise the suit, and the mannerisms are too tight to be natural; he imagines that this guy is being purposefully vague about who he is. Too many tall people work at Buzzfeed, he decides, sudden but not without previous thought on previous days. The tall man just extends a hand toward him as if inviting him to dance, tilting his head in the direction of the dancefloor. Ryan grins - Why not, you know? Might as well dance with the giant and have a little fun. 

“Let’s dance, then,” Ryan says, letting out a laugh as the tall man leads him to dance, taking his hand. There’s an hour or so of dancing, of spinning around a room swathed in red and not saying a word, but it’s a calm kind of silence, with a hand on his lower back and one in his. They’re standing too close to really be called dancing, with the other’s cheek against his temple and their chests warm against one another. Ryan somehow can’t stop himself from smiling, pleased with the fullness of his night even as they don’t speak; he didn’t know how much he craved silence. It’s when the night is winding down that he realises that he’s about to pull a Cinderella, leaving without one of them knowing the other’s identity. 

“I’ve gotta go. Maybe I’ll see you again,” Ryan tells the tall man, drifting out into the dancing crowd and making his way to the exit. 

“Ryan, wait! I -” the man calls after him, and Ryan recognises that voice, and he turns and he stops  _ Shane fucking Madej  _ in his tracks. 

“You absolute fuck!” he says, but he can’t keep the grin off of his face and he watches as Shane takes off the white and gold mask, revealing a tentative smile of his own. The look on his face is one that Ryan doesn’t know well, but it’s cute enough that he might like to. He’d been hoping it was Shane, in the back of his mind, but he knew it was far fetched - he thought is was far fetched. Shane’s looking down at him and looks like a spot of sunshine come to life, and Ryan grins. 

“I didn’t know how to say it,” Shane says sheepishly, scrubbing his hand across the back of his neck and ducking his head. 

“Do I really have to tell you to use your words?” Ryan replies, and he leans up to kiss Shane, finally. 

**Author's Note:**

> Leave me a prompt @halfwheeze on tumblr, and I'll get to it when I can!


End file.
